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Wednesday, August 26, 2015

How the PM put India on an even keel

Most of the
comments on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s first year in office have
given him full marks in the area of foreign policy.

With as many as 19 foreign visits, of which 16 were state visits, Modi has probably set a record of sorts.

The
visits can be looked at through the prism of geopolitics and
geo-economics. However, there has also been an additional “geocultural”
element in his outreach to the Indian community and in his efforts to
burnish India’s Buddhist credentials.

His key
achievement in this one year, has been to right the Indian ship of state
and place it on an even keel in the turbulent global waters of today.

Numerous visits

The
numerous visits allow us to see a clearer pattern of his government’s
geopolitical thinking. This is visible in a distinct preference for
aligning India with Western alliance through an outreach to the United
States, Japan and Australia.

On
the other hand, he has sought to maintain a geoeconomic balance in
showcasing India’s potential as the new manufacturing hub of the world.

Pragmatically, he has aligned India with China in its effort to reset the global financial order.

As
part of this, India has become part of Asian Infrastructure Investment
Bank and New Development (BRICS) Bank. He has actively courted and
obtained Chinese investment into India, perhaps, not as much as he would
have liked.

Modi’s
geopolitical outreach reveals three concentric circles — the outer one
including Mongolia, Japan, Vietnam, South Korea, and the US around
China’s periphery. In addition, there are two inner ones comprising
India’s immediate neighbours who are members of SAARC, and another which
took him to the island states of Sri Lanka, Mauritius and Seychelles in
Indian Ocean in March.

It
does not take a genius to understand that a great deal of what Modi has
been doing is to adjust India’s position in the regional system in the
context of the rise of China.

The
latter’s spectacular economic growth has had an inevitable political
fallout in India’s periphery and has tilted the balance of power against
us.

China
has not only become a major economic power, but is now in the process
of becoming a military power. This has implications for India because of
our difficult relations with Beijing. Our entire 3,500-km border with
China is disputed. Further, since the mid-1960s, Beijing has sought to
contain India in South Asia by using Pakistan’s unrelenting hostility to
India as its convenient instrument.

Today,
as China aspires for world power status, the simultaneous - though much
slower - rise of India is a matter of discomfort for it.

Chinese pressure

The
result is an intensification of Chinese pressure on India through
aggressive patrolling on the Line of Actual Control, the accepted border
between the two countries, as well as in Chinese activities in our
immediate neighbourhood.

While
Pakistan has been a constant factor, Chinese actions in Myanmar,
Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Maldives are of concern to New Delhi.

Some
of this is inevitable, given China’s expanding economic profile, but
the worry is that it is aimed at keeping India locked in South Asia.

Modi’s
achievement is that he has pushed a vigorous Indian response. As a
result, putative allies like the US and Japan, and presumed adversaries
like China and Pakistan, have a clearer picture of the way India
thinks. And this leaves no one in any doubt that the last thing New
Delhi will do is kowtow to Beijing.

Unique gesture

Modi
has been quite up-front in this. In an unprecedented gesture, he
invited US President Barack Obama to be the chief guest at the 2015
Republic Day celebrations. Further, and more significantly, he agreed to
sign up on a declaration on the Joint Strategic Vision for the Asia
Pacific and the Indian Ocean.

India
and the US have been moving close to each other since the early 2000s.
But somehow, New Delhi shied away from explicitly indicating the
direction it desired of this relationship.

The
Joint Vision may be a declaration, but it is also an important first
step. In a similar vein, Modi has been outspoken with the Chinese.
Instead of trying to paper over differences, Modi bluntly told the
Chinese during his state visit earlier this month that they should take a
“strategic and long term view” of their relationship with India and
“reconsider” their approach on “some of the issues that hold us back
from realising full potential of our partnership”.

How
this balancing will play out, only future can tell. But you cannot deny
Modi has been uncommonly energetic in pushing the Indian view.

At
the end of the day, the issue will be decided by how things play out on
the ground. If he is able to transform the Indian economy and put it on
a fast growth track in the coming years, he will sharply enhance
India’s weight in the international system.